Taking every Hallow's Eve Captive for Christ

One Reformed perspective on Halloween, one BBC Radio4 public-interest story, one mother (mine) who adores the silly-ness of Halloween, and one delightfully stimulating dinner conversation all add up to a question: is it good for our souls to celebrate all Hallow's Eve as a preparation for All Saints' by mocking the devil and showing the his powerlessness after the victory of Christ? Here's a snippet of the Reformed perspective mentioned above by James B. Jordan:

The concept, as dramatized in Christian custom, is quite simple: On October 31, the demonic realm tries one last time to achieve victory, but is banished by the joy of the Kingdom.

What is the means by which the demonic realm is vanquished? In a word: mockery. Satan’s great sin (and our great sin) is pride. Thus, to drive Satan from us we ridicule him. This is why the custom arose of portraying Satan in a ridiculous red suit with horns and a tail. Nobody thinks the devil really looks like this; the Bible teaches that he is the fallen Arch-Cherub. Rather, the idea is to ridicule him because he has lost the battle with Jesus and he no longer has power over us....

Similarly, on All Hallows’ Eve (Hallow-Even – Hallow-E’en – Halloween), the custom arose of mocking the demonic realm by dressing children in costumes. Because the power of Satan has been broken once and for all, our children can mock him by dressing up like ghosts, goblins, and witches. The fact that we can dress our children this way shows our supreme confidence in the utter defeat of Satan by Jesus Christ – we have NO FEAR!

When I first read this I thought that it would be a challenge to get this message across to small children, but the Radio4 story had little girls rattling off without any hesitation that the meaning of Halloween was "the victory of light over dark, which means we don't have to be afraid any more"!

Rather than a Frank-Peretti-style thriller pitching capable archangels against the swarthy powers of darkness, we have here holy laughter and the joy of the Spirit as the answer of Christ's people to the threats and scare-tactics of the devil. We spend many of the days of our year giving the devil more than his due; perhaps it is fitting to spend an evening remembering the joy of the kingdom, the powerless of evil to snatch us from Christ, and Christ's humiliation of Satan by the cross, resurrection, and ascension. Drawn up into the life and victory of Christ, is it not fitting that we too should scorn and deride the pride of the evil one?

This is a truth that can be taught to very young children, and perhaps is a better solution to the "Halloween problem" than harvest parties. I'm still thinking about it...but I have to say, I would love any little girl of mine to have the confidence in God's victory that I heard over the radio.

JMR on Rowling vs. Cooper

In case you're interested, John Mark Reynolds weighs in on Rowling versus Susan Cooper's Dark is Rising in a post (with different main concerns) on Scriptorium.

Pancho's 30th

For a large slideshow, click here or on the green triangle below. At Pancho's request, we had a orange and almond cake, but since 28 people were coming I made a sherry cake and a carrot cake, the latter of which acted as the official birthday cake since candles look best on frosting. We had a rousing chorus of happy birthday and, just generally, an absolute blast with our friends!

Exhortation for writers, including those of PhD's

No matter how just the criticism, any criticism at all which depresses you to the extent that you feel you cannot ever write anything worth anything is from the Devil and to subject yourself to it is for you an occasion of sin. In you, the talent is there and you are expected to use it. Whether the work itself is completely successful, or whether you ever get any worldly success out of it, is a matter of no concern to you….You do not write the best you can for the sake of art but for the sake of returning your talent increased to the invisible God to use or not use as he sees fit. Resignation to the will of God does not mean that you stop resisting evil or obstacles, it means that you leave the outcome out of your personal considerations. It is the most concern coupled with the least concern.

Flannery O'Connor

from the 25 Nov 1960 letter to "A" in The Habit of Being

Harry Potter found Orthodox, with thoughts on Rowling vs. Cooper

This is for those of you who've experienced a conversation that begins something like this:

You like Harry Potter books? But they're all about magic, and as a Christian I don't think we should indulge ourselves in reading something that is tainted with the occult. Besides, Harry lies and keeps secrets from adults - what kind of example is that for children?

At some point you then run into:

Well, C.S. Lewis is different. After all, Aslan is clearly Jesus. There's no God in Rowling's work.

And then:

Well, J.R.R Tolkein, he's different too. Besides LOTR is the book of the century - there maybe no God in LOTR, but Frodo is pretty Christ-like, isn't he?

And usually ends with:

Well, I just don't see the point of reading something like that. I'd be better off spending my time reading something more edifying.

The good news is you can now refer skeptics to a great article by Mark Shea, Harry Potter and the Christian Critics, posted on the First Things blog. WARNING: SPOILERS, esp. of the final book. For those of you disturbed by a certain part of the climax of the series, Shea comes up with a really helpful reading of the episode that might alleviate some concern.

I've recently been re-reading the first two books of Susan Cooper's The Dark is Rising series, soon to come out in the movies. Cooper is a very talented writer, in some ways more so than Rowling, but a comparison of the two reveals how much more deeply Christian is Rowling's work.

Cooper is a modern dualist, and says as much in her books (esp. in The Dark is Rising, where the world that she has created is explained to Will, the protagonist). The Light for Cooper is defined not by goodness and love, per se, but by its enmity to the Dark, an enmity that is part of the nature of the Light and not a choice. Dark and Light are equally matched opposites, and victory is not at all guaranteed to the Light. The Light are much more considerate of humans than the Dark, and indeed fight on their behalf, but are also willing to pragmatically sacrifice people to accomplish their purpose, something that the virtuous human characters do not do. Bound by their nature and equal to their adversaries, their mercy and love are limited to the tools at their disposal. The results are sometimes quite startlingly pitiless, as truth and mercy are run rough-shod over in order to defeat the Dark and to save humans from pain. There are no gods here; only the magical nature of things and certain persons, which are in turn bound by rules over which they have no control within a world where the bounds between nature and persons are blurred. Victory is through magical strength (whether of persons or things), cunning, and a splash of luck or destiny writ in the nature of things. The ultimate vision is rather bleak, although Cooper tries to stay upbeat. On top of all this, the Church is explicitly denigrated as powerless to fight evil and is implied to be founded on a benign falsehood. A well-meaning vicar tries to fight the Dark through Christian prayer and exorcism, only to be side-lined as ineffectual and treated rather like a brave but foolhardy child while the Light wage the real war and win through magic objects. Will's dualist theology provokes concern by the vicar, who quite understandably wants to have a talk with him someday, but Will's attitude towards him is that of a world-weary grownup who knows better.

There is none of this sort of thing in HP. Christ may not feature in Harry's world, but neither is He side-lined as He is explicitly in Will's world. Also, Rowling has a strikingly different understanding of the battle between good and evil than Cooper. Rowling consistently demonstrates the ultimate weakness of evil, for all of its hideous strength. It fails not because its wizards are not cunning--indeed, who is more cunning than Voldemort?--but because a wicked man is incapable of valuing what is truly valuable: his soul (among other things). As in LOTR and Narnia, evil is not countered by strength in HP, but by self-sacrificial weakness, love, and loyalty. No one is merely expendable, not even enemies (who are generally treated without mercy by Cooper). In HP, goodness or wickedness is not something that you're born to, but born out of the choices you make, and no one in the entire cast (except possibly Lily) makes perfect choices. All sin and fall short. Unlike Cooper's series, in Rowling's series mercy and repentence are not limited, but offered to all, even while the cost of rejecting mercy remains.

Anyways, go look at Shea's article - it's a good read, far better than these scattered musings.